But even here, Smith knows the fight against aid in dying will only work so long as the dying have palliative sedation to alleviate their suffering. He's working according to Catholic teaching which allows for the "double effect," or full sedation of patients if the effort is to end suffering, not life. In Montana, part of the case dealt with the fact that there is little difference between palliative sedation and aid in dying but the doctor's statement of purpose. It's an ideological distinction, not necessarily a practical one.

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About Me

The Good Death: An Exploration of Dying in America will be published by Beacon Press in February 2016.
I'm a writer (and hospice volunteer) living in Red Hook, Brooklyn, and writing primarily about the nexus of death and religion for publications like Guernica magazine (where I'm a contributing nonfiction editor), Harvard Divinity Bulletin, Bookforum, The Baffler, The Guardian, and The New York Times.

I am a Visiting Scholar at The Center for Religion and Media, NYU, and a contributing editor at The Revealer, the Center's publication (where I was editor until June 2013). I write the monthly column, "The Patient Body."

You can find my articles at annneumann.com.
I can be reached at otherspoon@yahoo.com, @otherspoon